Quail help please!!

[sniper338]

I got some coturnix and a&m quail yesterday... 5-6 weeks old... I got 2 eggs yesterday. My first eggs...

My problem is these birds were bought from a local breeder that once I arrived and saw their set up they are basically breeding em continuously and are selling em like hot cakes... the birds were over crowded by far in the cages... most have a lot of feathers missing down their backs and heads. They didnt seem to be fed a ton just bare minimum to keep em alive.... when I put food in there for them they went crazy and ate for 3 hours until they filled up... emptied a little 5 inch round feeder between the 17 birds I have...

My problem is they are pecking each other so bad... and fighting... I havent gotten home yet where I can separate them all a whole lot... I got another cage and put half of them in the other cage.. it seemed to help a lot... I still have some birds though that are just non stop chasing each other and pecking pulling feathers....

I took some clippers and snipped a tiny bit off their top beaks to where its just squared now... I did as much as I felt comfortable with without snipping into the wick in the beak so they dont bleed...

Is there anything else I can do to keep them from fighting so much? Or should they be fine now that the beaks are snipped where they cant get as good of a grasp on each other anyways...

I cant get them home to my cages until tomorrow...

 

[sniper338]

Heres some examples of how I clipped the beaks.. is that about right?

 

[sniper338]

 

[sniper338]

Some I couldnt clip as short because they had a longer wick in the beak and I didnt want to let them bleed...

I had one bird that had a little blood spot this morning on the back of its neck... thats why I just went ahead and clipped them... they dont seem to be bothering it now that I separated the trouble birds

 

[sniper338]

Oh gosh it didnt cross my mind... I found another cage out here at my ranch I can use... I separated the males out... that helped a lot... it was the males that were fighting so much... duh.. I should thought of that earlier... newbie mistake

 

[TwoCrows]

Sounds like you are on the right track. Because all these birds have been crowded and starved, they are aggressive. Hopefully over time, you can work this out of them.

The best thing you can do is to give them plenty of space right now. I know the standards for Coturnix is 1 square foot per bird. But you might want to offer these birds 2 or 3 square feet per bird for a while to cool them down, and give them time to relax and healthy up. Separate out the aggressive ones and offer up plenty of feeding stations. Over time you may be able to get these birds back together and shrink down the cage size, but you may need to keep it around 2 square feet for permanent housing due to their past. Birds don't forget this sort of thing, especially during times of stress and survival of the fittest.

Good luck!

 

[sniper338]

Since I got lucky and found another cage, I separated them and its made all the difference in the world!! They are at 1sqft per bird right now in groups of 4... after I did that and fed em more they all started roosting laying down and sleeping. No more pecking fights and chasing each other... males started breeding some females too. The males are all foamy when squeezed slighty... im just waiting on hens to come around and lay.... I got 2 eggs yesterday out of 13 hen coturnix.. none today so far

 

[sniper338]

Sounds like you are on the right track. Because all these birds have been crowded and starved, they are aggressive. Hopefully over time, you can work this out of them.


How does that beak cutting look to you?

The best thing you can do is to give them plenty of space right now. I know the standards for Coturnix is 1 square foot per bird. But you might want to offer these birds 2 or 3 square feet per bird for a while to cool them down, and give them time to relax and healthy up. Separate out the aggressive ones and offer up plenty of feeding stations. Over time you may be able to get these birds back together and shrink down the cage size, but you may need to keep it around 2 square feet for permanent housing due to their past. Birds don't forget this sort of thing, especially during times of stress and survival of the fittest.

Good luck!

 

[TwoCrows]

Glad to hear all is settling down for you! Since you just got these birds, they may stop laying for a short spell. Newly moved hens can clamp off the eggs till they get settled in and it is common to take a short break a week or two from the laying. However, some may continue to lay.

Good luck with your new birds!

 

[iluvmyquail]

The type of lightbulb and how bright the light and for how many hours it is on can also make a difference in aggression. Our birds are much more passive now that we have a less bright bulb in. If you have too many male to female ratio then the males will over-mate the females and pluck the head feathers. If you have too few males the females might bully them. If they get overheated or bored or don't have some dirt they can start pecking each other, too.